In the wholesale baking industry, automated systems and processes are used to produce baked products, such as breads, rolls, buns and the like, in large volumes and typically in a generally continuous manner. The pans within which such bread products are baked are usually displaced by conveyors to facilitate the movement of a large number of these baking pans, whether before, during or after the actual baking process, from one location within the establishment to another.
Generally, the baking pans are oriented with their open side up to accept dough and continue through the baking process. Once emptied of its baked contents, it is often advantageous to invert the pan or turn the pan upside down until its next use. This prevents unwanted debris from gathering inside of the pan. In addition, it is easier to clean an upside down pan, since gravity may assist brushes, air jets, etc. with removal of debris. When not in use, pans are stacked and removed from the baking line. Pans that are upside down create a more stable stack that is less prone to damage.
Typically, the prior art pan inverting systems include some type of rotating drum or wheel, having a number of radially extending flaps or clamps on which pans are loaded, one pan per paddle or clamp on the rotating drum/wheel. Once one or more pans are loaded, the wheel is rotated, thereby turning the pans end-over-end to turn them upside down before being unloaded from the wheel.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,230,360 discloses a baked good pan cleaner in which the pans are inverted solely for cleaning. In one embodiment, a pan flipper and cleaning brushes are provided to clean out a bakery pan. This approach utilizes a pan “gripper and flipper” which will grab the leading edge of a pan and flip it over so it is upside down. The pan then will be caught between a guide and rotating cleaning brushes, but, the pan being upside down, the debris and other matter dislodged by the cleaning brushes or gravity will fall into a catch pan located beneath the conveyor, under the rotating cleaning brushes. As the pan moves out from the rotating brushes, it engages a second pan gripper/flipper which catches the leading edge of the pan and rotates it over, so it is now right-side-up again, and either onto a conveyor or onto a stacker.
PCT Publication Number WO 2008/154751 discloses a pan inverting system having a rotating table. The table has substantially parallel pan-receiving surfaces on opposite sides of the table. The table is rotatably mounted within a frame for rotation about a longitudinal axis of the table. A pan engagement mechanism is disposed within the table and is operable to releasably fasten the pans to the pan-receiving surfaces of the table, such that when the pans are fastened to the pan-receiving surface by the pan-engagement mechanism, rotation of the table about the longitudinally extending axis will invert the pan.
Thus, while there have been various previous attempts to provide pan inverting systems, there are disadvantages associated with these known systems. With many prior art pan inverters, the process of inverting the pans twice can be quite time-consuming. In a continuous and high-volume production setting, any pan inverting system employed must be able to accommodate the very high throughput which is now required in most modern commercial bakeries. In addition, some of the prior art inverters do not allow the pan feed belt and pan removal belt to be at the same relative height. This can cause difficulties in a continuous baking line.
It would, therefore, be advantageous to provide a pan inverting device which eliminates the problems associated with the prior art and one which is capable of accommodating the full range of potential pan sizes typically found in a wholesale bakery.